


Day of the Dan

by ovely



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Crack, Gen, Reality, although you can read it as not platonic tbh, i swear this whole thing wasn’t an excuse to use the word ‘quinquagenarian’, platonic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-09
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-10-01 17:07:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10194596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ovely/pseuds/ovely
Summary: Dan slowly realises that everyone else is … also called Dan.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea why I thought of this.
> 
> Dedicated to the inordinate number of people I know called Daniel.

Dan got up at a comfortable eleven. It was quiet. Phil was already out, he realised, in some meeting about a solo project that was tentatively in the pipeline. No matter, Dan had to do the shopping. After a leisurely brunch, he jotted down a list and made his way downstairs.

He dropped into Starbucks on the way to Tesco, because hot chocolates always taste better when you don’t have to boil the water yourself, and Phil was out, after all.

“What’s your name?” asked the barista. (They didn’t always have to ask.)

“Dan,” he replied.

“Oh, me too,” said the barista, as he wrote D A N on the cup.

Dan laughed awkwardly. “What a coincidence,” he said, and paid for his hot chocolate.

With the drink delivered, he took it over to the corner, where he would be the most inconspicuous, and sank into the chair.

Halfway through the hot chocolate (which lived up to his expectations), he heard a faint voice from the next table saying, “Hi, Dan.”

Subscriber, he thought. A composed-sounding one, at least. The screamers weren’t always welcome in cafés, where people tended to just want to have a drink in peace. She didn’t sound too young either.

He turned to greet her, and saw only a businesswoman, probably in her forties, a stack of papers in front of her. Fortunately, she was sufficiently engrossed in her phone conversation not to notice his brief stare of confusion.

“OK, Dan, great,” she said into the phone.

Ah. Dan understood. A coincidence. A false alarm. He would be able to finish his hot chocolate without worrying about whether he was going to spill it over some poor teenager. Good.

The hot chocolate dealt with, Dan made his way into Tesco. There, he spent a happy fifteen minutes picking out food and planning the remainder of his day. Scripting a video once he got home, which would actually take most of the afternoon, and was pretty hard work, really. After that, he would probably waste away the evening on the internet. Ideal.

He barely registered that the cashier’s name badge said DAN on it until he had left the shop.

Odd, he thought.

Dan habitually got the bus home from Tesco to save hauling the shopping though the crowded north London streets. Although this was starting to seem like an unusual day, he wasn’t about to change this aspect of it. He hailed the bus, fumbled with his Oyster card until the machine acknowledged it, and took a seat halfway down the aisle.

A couple of stops before his own, a woman’s voice said, “Come on, Dan,” from the seat behind him, and two figures arose and made their way towards the exit.

Dan was looking forward to getting home.

Once there, he worked on his video script. He contemplated adding an anecdote about today’s encounters, but decided it wouldn’t really fit with the theme. Liveshow material, maybe. Halfway through the afternoon’s work, he conceived of some mindless tweet, quickly sent it from his phone, and got back to the script without waiting to see if there were any decent replies.

After finishing the script to his satisfaction, he grabbed his MacBook, retreated to the sofa crease, and settled on Tumblr as a worthy occupation to fill the time until Phil returned. Some time later, his wait was rewarded with a the familiar sound of the door opening.

“Hi, Dan,” Phil called from the hallway.

“Hi, Phil,” Dan replied.

There was a sound of approaching footsteps, and Phil appeared at the doorway, his expression somewhere between confusion and amusement. “Phil?” he said.

“Phil,” Dan repeated, suddenly feeling nauseous.

“Who’s Phil?” said Phil.

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” said Dan. “Don’t start playing tricks on me, my day has been fucking weird.”

Phil approached warily, taking a seat on the sofa a little further from Dan than usual. “What do you mean?” he asked placidly.

“Well, what the fuck is your name, if it’s not Phil?”

“Dan.”

Of course. Fuck.

“Oh, come on,” said Dan.

Phil looked blank.

“Give me your wallet,” said Dan.

Phil handed it over. Dan glowered at him, because that seemed appropriate, and retrieved Phil’s debit card.

MR DANIEL LESTER, it said, in embossed writing.

Better not let the viewers see that or they’d jump to some quite different conclusions, Dan thought momentarily, before examining the rest of Phil’s cards. There was a DANIEL LESTER on the driving licence, too, and a Dan Lester on the strangely pristine gym membership card, with a Dan Lester scrawled underneath it in Phil’s handwriting.

Dan looked back at Phil—no, Dan? No, that would be confusing, _Phil_ —and said, “What the fuck.”

“Are you OK, Dan?” said Phil, with an air of mild concern. “Have you, um, taken something?”

Dan ignored the question. “How long have you been called Dan?” he asked through gritted teeth.

“Um, forever?” Phil replied. “You—that’s—that’s why we live with each other? And we make videos together? You know, the Two Dans?”

Dan’s incredulous silence was apparently enough encouragement for him to continue.

“You know, like a double act—”

“ _OK_ ,” said Dan loudly. He decided to change tack. “Is there _anyone_ ,” he said, “who isn’t called Dan?”

“Um,” said Phil, and he thought about it, he actually _thought_ about it, for a good few seconds, before concluding in a small voice, “I can’t think of anyone.”

“Does that not seem weird to you?”

Phil shrugged.

“Right,” said Dan, “I’m going to think of a celebrity, _who is definitely not called Dan_ , and you’re going to tell me his name. So, the guy who plays”—his eyes flitted towards the television for inspiration—“Sherlock.”

“Oh, um, it’s something silly, isn’t it,” said Phil. “Cumberbatch, something Cumberbatch …”

“It’s a long name,” said Dan.

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“Does Benedict ring any bells?” Dan asked, once it had become clear that Phil wasn’t going to get it.

Phil frowned. “What, Benedict Cumberbatch? No, that’s not it.”

Dan awoke his MacBook, and googled “benedict cumberbatch”.

did you mean **_dan cumberbatch_**

“For fuck’s sake,” Dan said.

“Yeah, that’s it! Dan Cumberbatch!” said Phil, who was looking at the screen over his shoulder.

“Right,” said Dan humourlessly. “What about a woman, name a woman.”

“Um …,” said Phil. “Er, Fiona Bruce.”

“Fiona Bruce,” Dan repeated incredulously. Why Phil had thought of the quinquagenarian BBC newsreader was anyone’s guess, but at least women seemed to be immune to this Dan thing. He retrieved her Wikipedia page, and his eye caught the caption under the sidebar photo: “Bruce in 2013, with her husband, Dan.”

“For fuck’s sake,” he said again.

Afflicted by some sort of masochistic streak, Dan ran through some more male celebrities. Each time, Phil struggled to remember the first name until Dan googled the person and found they were called Dan, or suggested the name himself, at which point Phil would declare without exception that he remembered now, Dan was the right name. The one exception to this pattern was Dan Radcliffe, whose full name Phil recalled immediately.

After a few rounds of this, Dan moved on to men they knew personally. Phil’s father, apparently, was also called Dan, as was his brother.

“Didn’t that get confusing when you were growing up?” Dan asked.

“Not really,” said Phil. “I guess it would, now you mention it.”

“What about”—Dan fished around for some more potential non-Dans—“other YouTubers?”

“Not called Dan?”

“Yeah.”

Phil paused, and then shook his head blankly.

“What about the Fantastic Foursome?” Dan ventured.

“The what?”

“That—like a group, we had it a few years ago, us two and—”

“You mean the Four Dans?”

“ _Oh_ ,” said Dan sarcastically, “so we used to be the _Four_ Dans, right, and now we’re just the _Two_ Dans, right, of course. Silly me.”

“Yeah,” said Phil, not seeming to have picked up on Dan’s tone, “it kind of fell apart because they didn’t live near us, and our content kind of changed, and then one of the other Dans left YouTube for a long time—”

“I _know_ , Phil,” said Dan.

“Phil?”

“Fuck’s sake.”

Phil was apparently sufficiently unconcerned to be able to change the subject dramatically. “Hey, do you want to watch some anime during dinner?” he asked.

“Sure,” said Dan mindlessly. “I’ll cook,” and he scrambled to his feet, relieved to have some time when he would be the only Dan in the room.

As he opened the fridge, searching for culinary inspiration, his eye fell on a half-consumed jar of sweet and sour sauce.

 _Uncle Dan’s_ , it said on the label.

“Are you _fucking_ kidding me,” he said.

Some time later, Dan carried two plates into the lounge, loaded with the slightly haphazard dinners he had managed to concoct. Whatever was on the plates, one thing was certain: sweet and sour sauce would not have gone with it. At all.

Phil glanced up from his own MacBook. “Any anime preference?” he asked. “Comedy?”

“No,” said Dan viciously as he sat down. “Something sad.”

Phil seemed unconcerned. “OK,” he said. “Rewatch? Your Lie In April?”

“Sure.”

They watched the first episode. It hadn’t been long since Dan had last seen it, although he’d been sure the main character wasn’t called Dan before. And the same went for the other male characters. In fact, he was certain there had been no Dans at all in this anime until today. Now, on the other hand, there was a whole string of comedic moments involving confusion around which Dan was being referred to.

When Dan pointed out that this seemed incongruous in a serious, emotionally harrowing anime, Phil shrugged.

“Well, every anime’s got to have its funny bits,” he suggested.

Dan frowned. “I don’t get why they all have to be called Dan, though,” he said, knowing it was futile.

“Well, that’s why they call it danime.”

Dan was horrified. “They call it _danime_?!”

“No,” said Phil, looking concerned, “it was a joke. You know, it’s one of those things people say. Like, oh, that’s why they call it _dan_ cing, that’s why they call it, I don’t know, _dan_ tistry …”

“Nobody _ever_ says those things!” Dan exclaimed.

Phil blinked in placid confusion.

“Fuck it,” said Dan, and then, for good measure, “ _fuck_ it. I’m going to bed. Night, Phil.”

“Phil?” said Phil, but Dan was already out of earshot.


End file.
